Create a Sending, Name a Child
by vifetoile89
Summary: A poignant moment between Sabriel's mother and father, as they discuss their future, and her mother creates something that can help her child, even in Death. Takes place pre-Sabriel; one-shot.


Create a Sending, Name a Child

By Vifetoile (who does not own the Old Kingdom. But I promise, I'd rule it well.)

A/N: The names Megil and Heryn are from Tolkien's Elvish. No, really! (I found an online Elvish to English dictionary.)

* * *

"Terciel, what does your name _mean_, anyway?"

Terciel, the young Abhorsen, thought. "You know, I'm not really sure. I mean, 'El' refers to the Charter, that's easy."

"Yes."

"But 'Terc' – I'm not really sure."

The Abhorsen's young wife, Megil, shook her head. "Shame. But maybe we can deduce it. I mean, what's 'Terse'? 'Terse' is a word, right?"

"Yes, but…"

"And it means, silent, or something, right? 'Silence of the Charter'?"

"It means brusque, using few words."

"… 'Bluntness of the Charter.' Suits you, then." Megil kept a straight face, bent over her work, but her brown eyes danced as she looked at him.

"Oh, come on, Meg!" Terciel turned the meat over on the fire. "If you're so keen on name meanings, what's your name mean?"

"My parents told me. It means 'sword' in some dead language. Very feminine."

"Depends on what you mean by that." He said this as he turned the rabbit again, because it had been proven that Meg, cooking, somehow ruined every dish of food she came into contact with. Even toast.

"I hope I can look things up at Abhorsen's House." Meg ignored his last remark.

He frowned. "I never think of Abhorsen's House – good blazes, that means it's _my_ house now – as a place where you spend a lot of time."

"That's because you're silly." She held up the sheet of parchment that she was writing on. "I wonder if this would be enough. I also have to look up more Charter marks. You _do_ have a library, right?"

"Probably one of the better ones in the Old Kingdom!" He snapped – at this point in his life, he would not stand to hear his family line insulted in any way.

"Just checking."

"But you have the best memory for Charter marks I know – why do you need more of them for that thing you're making?"

"It's a very complex thing." Now she was rechecking her straight lines.

"And what, if I may ask, is it? I know you don't like to talk about the 'creative process,' but I'm very curious."

"Hm."

He took this as a sign that he may ask a question or two. "Very well. Is it a present for the baby?"

"Yes."

He paused before asking his second question, to contemplate the happy news his wife had given him just two weeks ago: soon they would have a child! He took the skinned rabbit off of the fire and took out his knife. "So, what inspired you to make this present?"

He expected to hear, a pretty dress in Belisaere, the Clayr nurseries, a nice seashell…

"Something that Heryn said to me."

Terciel's daydreaming stopped at once. He looked up. He couldn't bring himself to ask. Megil's voice had been so flat – and more than that, she had named Heryn. Heryn was a Clayr, and the voice of the Nine Day Watch when Terciel and Megil had visited the Glacier. It was after that visit that Megil had said she was pregnant. In fact…

"She said that our daughter – and yes, it's a daughter – is going to need a lot of help, early in her life. And she said…" she looked at her husband: he fought the Dead every day, and laid the dying to rest, he could surely take this news, "she said that I would likely die before I knew her."

"Why? Of what?" Terciel sat up, his hand automatically reaching for his sword. "An attack? A Dead creature? Sickness? We'll act now and…"

"Childbirth."

The energy that had sparked his face, briefly, went out.

He was silent for so long that Meg felt she had to speak again. "Women die in childbirth all the time. We shouldn't ever have assumed that I would be special."

"Why did she tell you?" he burst out. "I thought the Clayr believed in not telling people about their deaths!"

"Not all the Clayr believe that," she reminded him. "But more, I think she needed to tell me that. Or she thought that she needed to tell me. A warning, you know?"

"Why not tell _me_?"

"Maybe she was afraid of your reaction." In the silence that followed, she went on, "That's why I'm making this."

He swallowed, and could at last ask, "What is it?"

"I'm kind of making it up as I go along. I'll be honest." She held out the parchment. "But the plan is, it would be a kind of a Charter Sending, but more abstract. Our daughter could use it, and anyone of her blood – by the way, I'm going to have to have a sample of your blood for this – and it would do the things for her that I can't. I mean, it can't mother her, obviously…" her voice choked a little, but she went on, "But I know she's going to need a lot of knowledge, on hand, in the field, where it'll be useful. You talk all the time about how you'd love to have a portable library?"

"Um, yes…"

"It'll be a portable library. Basically. And we talked about what the Clayr said, about us needing a person familiar with Ancelstierre? Well, I've decided that if I – or, actually, you – set this somewhere along the river of Death, where she can access it, whether on this side of the Wall or the other – well, that would be a good thing, right? Also, by the way, I need you to put this in Death for me, when I'm finished with it."

"All the knowledge of a library…?"

"Yes. I was hoping to use the one at Abhorsen's house. I'll find some way to fill it with the knowledge in all those books –"

"Meg!"

"Well, maybe not _all_, but a good amount – and some of my own advice, of course, and form a way to let her access the information easily—"

"_Meg!_"

"—While in Death. I was thinking like a paper crane, or something. Easy and light. That'll use her blood, of course. And it's very hard to talk when you keep interrupting me, Terciel."

"Meg…" Terciel sat back and just stared at her.

She put the parchment aside. "Hey, you're letting the meat go cold." She sat to be next to him, and carved the rabbit carefully, dividing the meat up between them. "Eat up. You need your strength."

"So do you…" he said vaguely.

After they had eaten a bit, he said softly, "I would give everything to protect you. Both of you. Everything."

"I know. I know." She pushed a strand of brown hair away from her face. "But you can't, Terciel. You're also the Abhorsen. And so will our daughter. She'll need whatever I can give to her. I can't be there as her mother…" her voice broke, and she quickly wiped away some tears, "But I can leave her this. I've always been good at making things, and this is _going_ to work, even if it takes me every minute of the time I have left."

"The Clayr can be wrong." Terciel took his wife's hand.

"Yes…" Megil looked at him. "But even if they are wrong, I want to make this for her, as a gift."

He nodded. "I'll show her how to use the sending. And I'll keep her safe. I promise."

She nodded, and smiled at him. "Now, let's eat."

Terciel remembered that smile for a long time afterwards.

He remembered it as he held his daughter in his hands, on the rainy winter day of her birth, and Megil's death.

He had been far colder before, but his hands shivered as he held the child. So still. Like her mother. Only a faint drop of life left within her. But he could not – would not – give up.

So he voyaged into Death, and was amazed by the resilience of his daughter, that even at a few minutes' old, her spirit was strong enough to repel Kerrigor. She would be a good Abhorsen, he knew it.

She had taken on Megil's strength, like a blade reforged.

He only smiled again when he returned from Death, with a squalling, healthy baby in his arms. He gave her – little Sabriel – to the wetnurse to be fed, while he lay the spells of final rest on the body of Megil.

Before he began the prayer, he whispered, "Journey to the Ninth Gate and beyond, my love. Have no worries or fear. I will keep her safe… and I have given her a name, a token of you. I think you'd approve. It's Sabriel – Sword of the Charter."

* * *

A/N: The idea of 'El' being a reference to the Charter is a fact that in real life, names ending with 'El' typically refer to God in some way – Gabriel is "the messenger of God," Michael means "he who is like God," and so forth. Applying it to the Charter is easy enough. By this logic, Lirael is Song of the Charter, and Clariel (the star of the next Old Kingdom book) is Light of the Charter. And so forth.

By the way, Sabriel would be either Sword of the Charter or Cactus of the Charter. Your choice.


End file.
